Alchemy, huh?
by Morgaur
Summary: After getting body-slammed by a large truck, I awake in...I'm not sure where. All I know is it's white. And there is a weird giant floating door. And a bizarre figure with a monstrous grin calling itself 'Truth', 'God', and a whole mass of other things, offering me a new life. What. The. Hell. FMA: Brotherhood self-insert. Warning: rated T for later violence, and language.


**Okay, my first Fullmetal Alchemist fic! It's a self-insert (sorta) into the Brotherhood/Manga-verse. For the purposes of this fic, let's assume that I (the SI) have not watched FMA and am thus ignorant of the verse's existence. Not that it would matter anyway, as you will see below...**

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"Hello, Paul" a voice says. It sounds happy.

I'm slightly annoyed. I just died — well, probably, anyway. After all, the chances of surviving a large truck slamming into me at over sixty miles an hour, smashing me through a wall, then crushing me underneath it (truck, that is) and exploding extremely violently, are pretty slim. Anyway, there's no reason for whoever it is to sound happy.

I sit up, slowly — I'm hurting rather badly all over, though the pain is decreasing quickly — and look around me, trying to find the speaker.

I see nothing. Well, that's not quite accurate. I see white. A lot of white. Everything is white, except for this very, very, very large…uh…I'd say Monolith (ever seen 2001: A Space Odyssey?) in that it is huge, rectangular, and black; but it is also decorated with bizarre inscriptions and patterns, lots of circles and pentacles. It also seems to have a line running down the middle of it. It actually looks like a door. Not that I've ever seen such a monstrous door before. Also it's floating. Weird.

"Ahem," someone coughs behind me. "When you're quite done…" It's the same voice as before. Still sounding amused.

I turn round, intending to give whoever is finding my…afterlife?…so funny a piece of my mind. The words are stopped in my throat, however, by the sight of who — what — it is. There, sitting cross-legged in thin air (not that it's easy to tell, given how everything is white and messing with my depth perception) is a child-sized figure, also white but with a convenient flickering black aura round it. It is completely featureless, apart from the largest and most smug grin I have ever seen in my life on its face. Seriously. It stretches from one side of its face to the other and is full of the largest, whitest teeth I have seen outside of Colgate's promotional posters.

Gah, So much white.

"Uh," I say, eloquently. "Who the hell are you?"

The grin grows wider, if such a thing were possible.

"Who am I?" it says. "One name you might have for me is the world, or you might call me the universe, or perhaps God, or perhaps the Truth. I am All, and I am One. So, of course, this also means that I am you."

I blink.

"I'm sorry, you're me?" I reply. "I'm pretty damn sure I don't have teeth as impressive as yours," I demonstrate, baring my own uneven, creamy gnashers.

Truth — if that is indeed what it is, which I doubt, since it quite demonstrably isn't me and therefore is obviously not telling the truth — laughs. It's a short, vaguely mocking sound that leaves me feeling unnerved.

"I like you, you know," it says, resuming its grin. I don't even want to imagine what its cheek muscles must be feeling like. "I really like you."

"Well, thanks," I answer, "but I don't bat for…uh…_your_ team." I wave my hands at it, making a sort of 'you' gesture. "If that's what you mean."

Truth laughs again. "No, nothing like that. I mean that I've decided to give you another chance."

"I'm sorry, another chance at what?" I ask.

"At life, of course!" Truth replies, grinning triumphantly. Oh, right. I mean, that was totally obvious.

"Uh huh," I say, skeptically — I'm no fool, whatever else I may be. "And what's the catch?"

Truth laughs yet again. Honestly, this is getting old fast. I have spoken a total of three times, and it has laughed for each one. I may punch it if it does it again.

"Very good, human," it says. "Not many realise that there is a catch! Actually, there are two catches." I wait for a minute, then another. Eventually, it realises that I am not going to give it the pleasure of prompting it, and continues. "The first catch," it says, "is that you will not be going back to your universe."

Okay. Big catch.

"Don't worry, the universe you will be going to is almost identical to yours. You will have very little trouble fitting in. Technologically, it is on par with your nineteen-twenties, or thereabouts. Culturally…well, you don't need to worry on that score. I'll plant their language in your mind, and you really won't need much more." I nod slowly, feeling mildly reassured. The 1920s, eh? Could be worse.

"The second catch," it carries on, "is that you will have to give something up. Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. However, I'll give you a choice as to what you want to give up."

I bite my lip. 'Give something up', eh?

"What sort of thing can I give up?" I ask, tentatively. "I just need a sort of frame of reference."

Truth's grin turns predatory.

"Usually," it says, "the price is a body part, proportional to what you are being given. In your case, since you are being given a whole new life, it would have to be a substantial part of your body. Perhaps…since you gain a new life, the ability to create life…your male organ?"

I gape.

"My…my dick?" I gasp. Instinctively my hands move to cover it, protectively shielding it from whatever this obviously insane Truth will do. "No freaking way! Anything but that! Nor my balls, neither!"

"Well," Truth purrs, grin sharpening into something positively wolfish and carnivorous, "if you insist…how about…your humanity?"

"My humanity?" I repeat. "So I'll be an animal or something?"

"Oh, no, nothing like that," Truth says. "Just a human without humanity, without a soul. A homunculus, if you will."

"How the hell would that work?" I ask, bewildered and not a little afraid. "Also that's not what homunculus means."

"Simple," Truth replies, ignoring my latter statement. "You would look human, act human, seem human in every way…but you wouldn't be human. Though you'd feel a human's urges, you would not need to fulfil them. So you would feel tired, but you wouldn't actually need to sleep. You would feel hungry, but not need to eat. The feelings would pass, and you'd not be harmed. You would not age, not die…any injury and you'd heal, instantly."

"Uh huh," I say. "So basically, immortality. Now that _definitely _comes with a catch, or two or three, besides the whole 'live to see all your friends die…again, and again, and again' business. What are they?"

"Three catches," Truth confirms. "One, you'd be _ipso facto_ the servant and, well, son, of an insane psychopath intent on sacrificing the entire population of a country to fuel his (ultimately futile) ascent to Godhood. Two, your immortality would be conferred through a Philosopher's Stone inside you, which is essentially the collected and condensed souls of thousands of people. Each death you suffer would be a death for one of those souls. Three, you'd be — following on from the whole 'son' aspect of the first — sibling to a group of seven psychopaths who are the incarnations of the seven deadly sins."

I nod, slowly. "Well," I say, "that really sucks. I mean, _really, really _sucks." I sigh and shake my head. "So, lose my dick or become some sort of monster-thingy. Are there any other alternatives?"

Truth hums thoughtfully. "I suppose…yes, there is," it says. "You know," it adds, conversationally, "this is another reason why I like you. Most people I've offered this sort of choice to don't have the patience to go through their choices like this. They just leap at the one immediately after the penis-sacrifice. The men, at least. Anyway, your third choice — which, incidentally, is also your last; three and no more, you see — is this: your memories."

"My memories?" I repeat, incredulously. "Is that it?"

"Yes," Truth replies. "Your memories. Everything, from birth to this entire conversation. You would be, essentially, a clean slate. I would, of course, give you some new ones — your name, a basic but nonspecific background — but you would be essentially a completely new person."

"And you didn't mention this choice first exactly _why_?" I demand, and Truth laughs.

"Where would the fun in that be?" it asks.

"Fair point," I mutter.

"So, I assume you'll take the third choice?" Truth asks.

"Uh…yeah," I say. "It's less of a sacrifice than the other two." I pause a moment, thinking, then add, "If I sacrifice my lowest pair of ribs, you know, the floating ones, and my appendix would you be able to give me a little extra? Like maybe a more powerful physique, or greater intelligence, that sort of thing?"

Truth laughs, and I repress (with difficulty) the urge to hit it. "I really, really like you," it says, for what seems like the millionth time. "You're offering up relatively useless parts of the body — which nevertheless are legitimate sacrifices — the removal of which will either have little effect on your every-day functioning, or will actually be somewhat beneficial, in exchange for more benefits!" It shakes its head, though the grin remains. "You know what, I'll give you something extra. Something that you'll find very useful where you're going. Alchemy."

"Alchemy?" I repeat, painfully aware that I'm repeating things it's saying quite a lot. "You mean that lead-into-gold crap?"

"No, not the alchemy of your world. The alchemy of Amestris, where you are going. You'll see," it says, "you'll see. You'll like it. A lot." It raises a hand, and I hear a creak behind me. I glance round to see the massive door opening slowly, thousands of tiny black hands reaching through it, snaking towards me on impossibly long arms.

"What the hell?" I squawk, tripping over my own feet as I try to get away from the hands.

"Don't worry," Truth says, and I stare at it, panic-struck, as the hands seize hold of me and begin to pull me into the blackness within the door. "You'll be fine," it adds. It waves as the door begins to close, and I see tiny patches of colour appear within it — two pairs of lines at around stomach level, and a tiny dot sort of off-centre in the abdomen. My body parts, I assume.

"Goodbye, Paul," Truth calls, just before the door closes, and then all is black.

Makes a change from the blinding white of…wherever that was. My eyes were really starting to water by the end.

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**Well? Thoughts? Ideas? Liked it? Didn't like it? Let me know, guys, let me know. See the little text-box below? Type whatever it is you want to say into there and hit the button beneath it marked 'Post review as...', alright?  
****Seriously, though, I need reviews. If you imagine the fic as a machine, reviews are the fuel that power said machine. So, review! :)  
****I know this was rather short, but then it was just the intro. I promise, next chapter will be at least 5000 words long.  
****Finally...I cannot make any promises about update times. Seriously. I have no clue when I will next update. Hopefully it will be soon. You guys can make it sooner...by reviewing!  
Okay, Morgaur out.**


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